Another way I have used socrative, is to gather information about what students already know. I created a math test, using short answer questions and a few true/ false questions. This gave me so much instant information, that I could easily plan my math lessons for the week.

I also designed a short answer maths test with the answers already programmed in. The students took this at their own pace. I then printed them out their own individual worksheet, with the questions and answers, all marked. From this, they decided which workshops they needed to come to for further math teaching. They also worked collaboratively, to fix up any errors they had made in the test after the workshops.

The exit ticket looks like a great way to gather information about how the learning has gone in the lesson also. Can't wait to try that out this week. I would totally recommend this app to everyone - limitless possibilities. Check out the socrative blog for more great ideas.

You can make and design your own tests, which are great, but the real power of socrative comes with the "quick question." Then socrative becomes like a mix of padlet and activ votes all in one and a brilliant collaborative tool.

Here's how we used it last week. Our students were working in learning partners, a strategy that we use all the time. Often they will have mini white boards to work on. This works well, but socrative took it to a whole new level.

We are currently doing a narrative writing unit. We used a writing app to bring up different pictures - settings, characters etc. Then using the quick question setting, we asked the learning partners to write a descriptive sentence. Straight away, the sentences start coming up on the board. A buzz spread throughout the room. The incidental reading of each other's ideas was terrific. Then, by pushing "start vote", the students got to choose which descriptive sentence they thought was best. So now the competition was ON!

My co-teacher and I were blown away. The quality of the writing improved with each activity. Students were trying to out do each other, hoping to be voted the best by their peers. The level of accountability was great. Instead of hoping that the students were discussing and completing an activity, we could tell by the online counter once everyone had contributed and read everyone's ideas.

At the end of the activity, with one click I sent all the responses to my google drive. After school I printed them out and made them into mini-posters for our writing wall.

Here's a snippet of some of the writing, where the students were describing a dragon.

I am gradually wading through my notes and ideas gained from this years GAFE Summit South. Once again, a brilliant professional learning opportunity. I always love it when you get a practical idea that is super easy to implement into the classroom and this year's one is LIFE CHANGING! It is the brilliant, wonderful socrative.com. Socrative is a classroom quiz tool, that provides instant information for teachers, depending how you use it.

Socrative kind of works in 2 ways. Firstly, you set up a teacher account. Make sure you go into the settings and set up an easy room log in. For example, mine is SPARK2. Students also log into socrative as a student using your room code. It works on every device. I'm sure socrative was designed to help American teachers prepare for standardised tests, but it can be used in so many cool ways.

Here's a simple introductory video. The interface has now changed visually, but the options are still the same.

"Equipping kids with iPads in the classroom is nice, but Gilbert advocates a fundamental shift. She urges us to think beyond surface features such as technology in schools and to consider how our learning environments are structured to create inquiring minds. Without these skills, future generations can never hope to solve significant issues such as climate change, social inequality and the impact of globalisation.

I love that phrase - " how our learning environments are structured to create inquiring minds." It made me wonder:How do we ensure that the environment is the third teacher?How do we as teachers who have been educated in a traditional way make a REAL shift to be future focused?How can we fight against the crowded curriculum, the traditional curriculum and let the kids drive the learning?Not just as Jane says: ﻿"We’re still working within the same twentieth-century framework. The thinking hasn’t changed. "It’s just couching what we’ve already done in much fancier production values. It looks cooler and more digitised, but the underlying educational objectives have not changed."﻿

If you don't follow idealog on facebook, make sure you do! Excellent articles on a range of cutting edge topics!

Sensible, practical and on the money! Could be a great starting point for those beginning their MLP journey. Also, a great way for those of use implementing and developing MLP to check point how we're doing - successes, failures, things that have fallen by the wayside.

Author

My name is Ngaire Shepherd-Wills. This website is a record of my TeachNZ sabbatical, Term 2, 2013 and then I have continued to share my wonderings and discoveries about Innovative Learning Practices. I now work for CORE Education. Views are my own.